Studies in the Thought World

Nature speaks to us in a language of her own. If her intonations sound harsh or unmusical, we may infer that our hearing is not attuned to her utterances. If her voices are unknown tongues, we need carefully to study her rhythm and accent, in order that we may translate her message. Nature is not Nature until we awaken the spirit of interpretation. We are unable to understand her motive until we take her into our confidence, and make her intimate acquaintance.

What is Nature, and what does she signify to us? What is her kingdom, and where its boundaries? Do we really see her, or only her signs and outpicturings? Is she essentially color, form, proportion, length and breadth, or life, mind, and spirit?

Truth must be a full-orbed unit, else she is untruthful. The physicist, while studying forms and properties, may be color-blind to the presence of a universal spiritual dominion. Dissociated from her vital essence, Nature is incongruous and misleading. The materialist interprets her as mechanical, cold, and even cruel. The scientist tests her qualities, and geometrizes her proportions, but does not hear her voices. The theologian, with eyes turned toward the supernatural, does not feel her warm, vital supports and inter-relations to the spiritual realm. Even the artist often catches only her complexion, while her warm and friendly temperament is unrecognized. Each thereby makes his own system misleading and unnatural. Only the spiritual chemism of the poet and idealist divines her affinities, and penetrates to her true inwardness.

The attempt to turn Religion away from Nature, into an arbitrary and unrelated realm, has drained it of its normal and abounding vitality; and, on the other hand, the materialism of Science has kept its gaze turned steadily downward. To the practical vision of the world the supernatural is unnatural, and the unnatural, morbid. Nothing unnatural can be attractive. Religion and science have each been weighted down as they have diverged from the normality of the established divine order.

Religion, in its normal simplicity, may be defined as orderly unfoldment which brings into manifestation the divine pattern. The natural world, in its methods and transmutations, is an articulation of the Father. The genius of Nature is an open gospel for all who can decipher its unrolled manuscript. But only the key of the spiritual intuition can unlock the motives and mysteries of cosmic forces, and disclose their beneficent order and rhythm.

The divinity in man recognizes its eternal counterpart,—God in Nature,— and feels the ecstatic thrill of the Omnipresent Spirit. Divine monograms and hieroglyphics are stamped upon all his environment, and he dwells in a boundless repository of mystery, harmony, and sanctity. As our spiritual vision grows clearer, the objective universe takes on intrinsic gracefulness and sublimity. The mirror of an uplifted consciousness reflects new revelations of cosmic harmony and unity. God is the mind of Nature. He whispers to us in every leaf, flower, and blade of grass; in the air, the clouds, the sunshine, the sea. All are eloquent from within. Each is a glowing sentence in the great open volume of universal Scripture. As the sea contains all its waves, so the One Life embraces all finite forms of vitality. This concept is a warm and living spiritual theism, and has no alliance with pantheism. Everything is soulful. Shapes and colors are delightful to the degree that we grasp their plasticity to spiritual moulding from within. Pope’s familiar lines are more than poetry:—

If we delve deeply enough into the laws and constitution of rocks, plants, animals, and man, we everywhere discover the footprints of the unifying and energizing Presence. The revelations of Deific wisdom and spiritual vitality are as scientifically accurate as they are æsthetically transcendent. To feel our spiritual oneness and relativity to all things, is to expel infelicity and leanness from our consciousness. Such a transformation is, in itself, evidence of the truth of the principle. Mature is friendly. Her correspondences with us are so intimate and reciprocal, that they demonstrate infinite wisdom, unity, and adaptability. Bryant, in his “Thanatopsis,” beautifully moulds this thought in his familiar lines:—

The barrenness and untruthfulness of atheism are evident from their utter inability to awaken human responsiveness. Nothing is abnormal save that which is created by man’s defective and misplaced consciousness. He alone can cloud his own horizon. The much-vaunted achievements of material science cannot lift the load of human woe, or satisfy the universal soul-hunger. Whatever is unnatural is a distortion of the divine type. The deadly upas of artificialism is a blight upon literature, society, and institutions. A debasing so-called realism, claiming to be artistic, raises a false and perverted standard in the measurement of fiction, the drama, and real life. To paint abnormity in picturesque and vivid outline is a perversion, of true art. Only that which is divine and normal in type can possess veritable artistic proportion. Even intellectual development, as usually defined, is powerless to lift men above the plane of shadows and illusions.

With an arbitrary and materialistic treatment Nature is severed from her vital relations, and becomes a caricature, mechanical, cold, and even adverse. The over-wrought refinements of a hyper-civilization, which subtly beckon us away from the natural type, promise much, but finally end in chaotic degeneration. The blandishments of fashion, society, display and ambition seductively whisper their charms; but following close in their train are barrenness, bitterness and heartlessness. As institutions take on abnormal shape and character, they invite decay. Civilizations, even when most distinguished for material grandeur and æsthetic culture, become top-heavy, and fall, because they lack a simple but broad archetypal basis.

We are touched on every side with life: The outward forms of buds and leaves and flowers may wither and fade from our sight, but the life which for a while held them in form is not lost, but conserved for further expression in yet sweeter and nobler shapes. New worlds are continually created before us for fuller revelations of truth. Every changing season opens fresh vistas, and slips new slides into the lenses of subjectivity which open outwards. Divine laws are engraven all about us, and each is interpreted through its own chosen and particular symbol. Nature has its parables and precepts, its comedies and tragedies. The Decalogue, psalmody, prophecy, the incarnation, sacrifice, and resurrection, are objectively written in living characters all about us, and subjectively inscribed in exact correspondence in the tablets of man’s constitution. There are platforms and pulpits on every hand, from each of which is expounded the divine completeness of the established order. Poesy bids us:—

That vision is inspired which beholds mountains, forests, and rocks as cathedrals and altars, which enshrine the divine bounty and radiance. We are walking upon enchanted ground, and bushes are aflame all about us, and yet are not consumed.

A true translation of Nature is not a mental construction, an allegory, or a fancy, but a vision of a living reality working out its grand purpose. We should not read her superficially, as a shallow critic may read a book, with eyes only for its style and construction, but with open soul for her vital meaning and interpretation. But she is shy of her richness, and must be wooed and followed by sympathetic association, in order that she may respond with hearty communication. To pursue her with a mathematical chart, or an intellectual measuring-stick, is to chill and alienate her, so that from a warm and loving mother she becomes only a conventional stranger, made up of mechanical powers and forces.

To the penetrative vision of the Hebrew prophets, Nature was but a transparent medium, through which they clearly saw the Infinite. The fervid imagery of Isaiah gave tongues and voices to every animate thing, and all joined in a universal anthem of praise.

But, as a whole, a sombre shadow overcasts the sacred Hebraistic literature. The Deity was infinite physical force, more than omnipresent Spirit and Love. With an exuberant poetic and artistic symbolism, there is lacking that broader and grander consciousness of divine harmony, unity, and goodness with which a truer concept thrills the soul. Human fellowship and oneness with the spirit of Nature is a later and higher ideal than that of the Old Testament poets and seers.